JPMorgan Chase & Co. Forecasts Strong Price Appreciation for Viasat (NASDAQ:VSAT) Stock

Key Points

• JPMorgan Chase & Co. has raised its target price for Viasat stock from $10.00 to $23.00, indicating potential downside from the current price.
• Multiple analysts have issued positive ratings on Viasat, with an average price target of $21.13 and a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy."
• Viasat's stock recently saw a significant rise, trading up 30.7% to reach $27.82, driven by strong trading volume.

Viasat (NASDAQ:VSAT - Get Free Report) had its target price upped by JPMorgan Chase & Co. from $10.00 to $23.00 in a research note issued on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has a "neutral" rating on the communications equipment provider's stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s target price would indicate a potential downside of 17.33% from the stock's current price.

A number of other research analysts also recently weighed in on VSAT. Needham & Company LLC raised their price target on Viasat from $16.00 to $25.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Wednesday. B. Riley decreased their price target on Viasat from $56.00 to $52.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, May 27th. William Blair raised Viasat from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating in a research report on Monday. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price objective on Viasat from $14.00 to $16.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 17th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Viasat has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $21.13.

Viasat Trading Up 30.7%

NASDAQ:VSAT traded up $6.53 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, hitting $27.82. The company had a trading volume of 17,820,668 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,596,092. Viasat has a fifty-two week low of $6.69 and a fifty-two week high of $28.59. The business's fifty day moving average is $13.78 and its two-hundred day moving average is $11.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.41, a quick ratio of 1.55 and a current ratio of 1.72. The firm has a market cap of $3.73 billion, a P/E ratio of -6.25 and a beta of 1.20.

Viasat (NASDAQ:VSAT - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 5th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.17 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.15) by $0.32. The company had revenue of $1.17 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.13 billion. Viasat had a negative return on equity of 7.10% and a negative net margin of 12.72%. The company's revenue for the quarter was up 4.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.30 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Viasat will post -0.54 earnings per share for the current year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Viasat

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of VSAT. Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new position in shares of Viasat in the 4th quarter valued at $159,000. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC bought a new position in shares of Viasat in the 4th quarter valued at $135,000. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS bought a new position in shares of Viasat in the 4th quarter valued at $130,000. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Viasat by 1.4% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 13,773,860 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock valued at $117,216,000 after purchasing an additional 194,006 shares during the last quarter. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its stake in shares of Viasat by 150.2% in the 4th quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 706,792 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock valued at $6,015,000 after purchasing an additional 424,317 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 86.05% of the company's stock.

About Viasat

Viasat, Inc provides broadband and communications products and services worldwide. The company's Satellite Services segment offers satellite-based fixed broadband services, including broadband internet access and voice over internet protocol services to consumers and businesses; in-flight entertainment and aviation software services to commercial airlines and private business jets; satellite-based connectivity services; mobile broadband services, including satellite-based internet services to energy offshore vessels, cruise ships, consumer ferries, and yachts; and energy services, which include ultra-secure solutions IP connectivity, bandwidth-optimized over-the-top applications, industrial internet-of-things big data enablement, and industry-leading machine learning analytics.

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